We have a nice life, my husband and I and our little family, in our pretty little house in our pretty little town in Ontario. We have a verandah, which is something that I always wanted when I was growing up: a verandah with a pretty wicker bench and soft cushions and a hydrangea vine climbing up to the porch overhang and providing dappled shade. And Emilia’s school is just down the road, as is Jasper’s daycare and the dance academy and the karate dojo and the cafe that brews perfect lattes. It’s a perfect, picturesque, exurban existence. And one that I think I might want to walk away from.

This happens every time that I visit British Columbia, where I grew up, where all of my remaining family still lives, where I am happy, where I feel like I fit into the landscape organically, naturally. Where I feel at home. Every time that I visit, I wonder, what if we came back? BC is expensive, sure, but couldn’t we sell our house in Ontario and move into some teeny little place, somewhere out in the desert boonies, somewhere like my dad’s place, maybe, and just become hippies? Go rafting and rock-climbing and grow ginseng or raise goats and I’d write books and Kyle would build his straw bale house and we’d drink wine and make Saskatoon berry pies and just be together, seizing the day, not worrying about upward mobility or balancing schedules or finding the best Montessori daycare for Jasper, just being.

Being home.

I really kind of think I’d like that.

(The trip that I’ve been on was sponsored by GM Canada. We drove Buicks, which were awesome and comfortable, of course, but I appreciated them mostly as nostalgia caravans, transporting me from long-loved locale to long-loved locale with a fewwinery and rock-climbing stops in between. Which is what a good vehicle is, no? Anyway, for all of that, I’m so profoundly grateful.)